What gets me is the phrasing they use. I'm not sure whether the things listed are what the complainers actually said, or if the reporters are just summing things up that way.

For example with the ad about child abuse, I would expect to hear "I saw this ad, I was abused as a child, this ad therefore upset me" or "my children saw this ad, they are not abused but are now upset to think that other children less fortunate than them might be being abused, and are having nightmares about it" Both are quite logical and reasonable complaints (IMO),from people actully effected, regarding what was clearly an emmotive advert.

The way its being reported though is like this:

"Many of the 840 complainants were concerned with the imagery of abuse and drug use, especially because the ads were being shown at times when children could be watching"

So does this mean that their own children were not affected (maybe they don't even have children) but thay are complaining on behalf of any children who may have seen the ad and may have been affected by it?

Likewise,

Some other viewers, who reported they had been abused as children, asked whether the imagery could upset some people who had suffered such treatment

If they're "asking" then it's a question not a complaint? They are saying that they were abused, they are not saying that because of this fact they were upset by the ad, but they are asking whether people who were abused could be upset by the ad?

I guess this is the biggest problem I have with this sort of thing - people complaining "on behalf" of other people. "Such and such a group/gender/race could be offended by this or that, although I personally am not in this instance"

(In some cases of course you would want someone to complain on behalf of someone else who may not be able to complain themselves, but surly in the majority of cases people CAN speak for themselves?)

I hardly saw any of those, but now wish I had seen the "overtly sexual" one for Orangina...

(Personally, I think Ross/Brand is different. I have no problem with someone complaining on principle. It was more to do with people being offended at the idea of the BBC uncritically paying vast sums of money to unfunny bullying cretins. But we've been over that ad nauseam. )

The Orangina advert was a bit weirdly sexual it has to be said. It's the only one of those adverts that I found remotely "odd". Complaining that a Specsavers advert trivialises Edith Piaf suggests to me that some folk have too much time on their hands though...

Mind, the Piaf complaint is interesting. Can you imagine anyone trying to run a campaign in which they dubbed footage of Princess Di for comic effect? That would be a surefire complaint record I suspect.

i love the bit about the highway code and the dog in the front seat. you can just see someone sitting down with their camomile tea and almost spitting it out whilst viewing the televisual blashpemy peddled by Volkswagen....